Global Warming (yet again)

[hrothgar]

Great article in this morning's New York Times:

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/science/...&pagewanted=all

 

For more than a decade the Global Climate Coalition, a group representing industries with profits tied to fossil fuels, led an aggressive lobbying and public relations campaign against the idea that emissions of heat-trapping gases could lead to global warming.

 

“The role of greenhouse gases in climate change is not well understood,” the coalition said in a scientific “backgrounder” provided to lawmakers and journalists through the early 1990s, adding that “scientists differ” on the issue.

 

But a document filed in a federal lawsuit demonstrates that even as the coalition worked to sway opinion, its own scientific and technical experts were advising that the science backing the role of greenhouse gases in global warming could not be refuted.

 

“The scientific basis for the Greenhouse Effect and the potential impact of human emissions of greenhouse gases such as CO2 on climate is well established and cannot be denied,” the experts wrote in an internal report compiled for the coalition in 1995.

 

The coalition was financed by fees from large corporations and trade groups representing the oil, coal and auto industries, among others. In 1997, the year an international climate agreement that came to be known as the Kyoto Protocol was negotiated, its budget totaled $1.68 million, according to tax records obtained by environmental groups.

 

Throughout the 1990s, when the coalition conducted a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign challenging the merits of an international agreement, policy makers and pundits were fiercely debating whether humans could dangerously warm the planet. Today, with general agreement on the basics of warming, the debate has largely moved on to the question of how extensively to respond to rising temperatures.

 

Environmentalists have long maintained that industry knew early on that the scientific evidence supported a human influence on rising temperatures, but that the evidence was ignored for the sake of companies’ fight against curbs on greenhouse gas emissions. Some environmentalists have compared the tactic to that once used by tobacco companies, which for decades insisted that the science linking cigarette smoking to lung cancer was uncertain. By questioning the science on global warming, these environmentalists say, groups like the Global Climate Coalition were able to sow enough doubt to blunt public concern about a consequential issue and delay government action.

 

George Monbiot, a British environmental activist and writer, said that by promoting doubt, industry had taken advantage of news media norms requiring neutral coverage of issues, just as the tobacco industry once had.

 

“They didn’t have to win the argument to succeed,” Mr. Monbiot said, “only to cause as much confusion as possible.”

 

William O’Keefe, at the time a leader of the Global Climate Coalition, said in a telephone interview that the group’s leadership had not been aware of a gap between the public campaign and the advisers’ views. Mr. O’Keefe said the coalition’s leaders had felt that the scientific uncertainty justified a cautious approach to addressing cuts in greenhouse gases.

 

The coalition disbanded in 2002, but some members, including the National Association of Manufacturers and the American Petroleum Institute, continue to lobby against any law or treaty that would sharply curb emissions. Others, like Exxon Mobil, now recognize a human contribution to global warming and have largely dropped financial support to groups challenging the science.

 

Documents drawn up by the coalition’s advisers were provided to lawyers by the Association of International Automobile Manufacturers, a coalition member, during the discovery process in a lawsuit that the auto industry filed in 2007 against the State of California’s efforts to limit vehicles’ greenhouse gas emissions. The documents included drafts of a primer written for the coalition by its technical advisory committee, as well as minutes of the advisers’ meetings.

 

The documents were recently sent to The New York Times by a lawyer for environmental groups that sided with the state. The lawyer, eager to maintain a cordial relationship with the court, insisted on anonymity because the litigation is continuing.

 

The advisory committee was led by Leonard S. Bernstein, a chemical engineer and climate expert then at the Mobil Corporation. At the time the committee’s primer was drawn up, policy makers in the United States and abroad were arguing over the scope of the international climate-change agreement that in 1997 became the Kyoto Protocol.

 

The primer rejected the idea that mounting evidence already suggested that human activities were warming the climate, as a 1995 report by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had concluded. (In a report in 2007, the panel concluded with near certainty that most recent warming had been caused by humans.)

 

Yet the primer also found unpersuasive the arguments being used by skeptics, including the possibility that temperatures were only appearing to rise because of flawed climate records.

 

“The contrarian theories raise interesting questions about our total understanding of climate processes, but they do not offer convincing arguments against the conventional model of greenhouse gas emission-induced climate change,” the advisory committee said in the 17-page primer.

 

According to the minutes of an advisory committee meeting that are among the disclosed documents, the primer was approved by the coalition’s operating committee early in 1996. But the approval came only after the operating committee had asked the advisers to omit the section that rebutted the contrarian arguments.

 

“This idea was accepted,” the minutes said, “and that portion of the paper will be dropped.”

 

The primer itself was never publicly distributed.

 

Mr. O’Keefe, who was then chairman of the Global Climate Coalition and a senior official of the American Petroleum Institute, the lobby for oil companies, said in the phone interview that he recalled seeing parts of the primer.

 

But he said he was not aware of the dropped sections when a copy of the approved final draft was sent to him. He said a change of that kind would have been made by the staff before the document was brought to the board for final consideration.

 

“I have no idea why the section on the contrarians would have been deleted,” said Mr. O’Keefe, now chief executive of the Marshall Institute, a nonprofit research group that opposes a mandatory cap on greenhouse gas emissions.

 

“One thing I’m absolutely certain of,” he said, “is that no member of the board of the Global Climate Coalition said, ‘We have to suppress this.’ ”

 

Benjamin D. Santer, a climate scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory whose work for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was challenged by the Global Climate Coalition and allied groups, said the coalition was “engaging in a full-court press at the time, trying to cast doubt on the bottom-line conclusion of the I.P.C.C.” That panel concluded in 1995 that “the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate.”

 

“I’m amazed and astonished,” Dr. Santer said, “that the Global Climate Coalition had in their possession scientific information that substantiated our cautious findings and then chose to suppress that information.”

[Winstonm]

“I’m amazed and astonished,” Dr. Santer said

 

I don't know why - did he think human nature had changed?

[Aberlour10]

Before the financial crisis began in autumm, there were 1000 & 1 articles, reports, documentals, in all german media about this theme, day by day and now? Opel, bad banks, good banks, billions-€-rain over the economy...and any single article about global warming in mainstream media's. Politicans? Silence! I am afraid the couple of years are lost before it returns on world's agenda seriously.

 

Robert

[helene_t]

To me, environmental considerations come first. Unless, of course, .......

[PassedOut]

I'm sure all but the most credulous realized that this was going on, but the confirmation is welcome. The cigarette companies did the same thing, and so did the manufacturers of DDT, asbestos, and so on.

[luke warm]

I'm sure all but the most credulous realized that this was going on, but the confirmation is welcome. The cigarette companies did the same thing, and so did the manufacturers of DDT, asbestos, and so on.

all i know is, ddt used to kill ***** real good

[hanp]

It would be interesting to read more comments from those that have argued in this forum along the lines of the Global Climate Coalition.

[matmat]

I'm sure all but the most credulous realized that this was going on, but the confirmation is welcome. The cigarette companies did the same thing, and so did the manufacturers of DDT, asbestos, and so on.

all i know is, ddt used to kill ***** real good

yeah. it killed ***** dead.

[helene_t]

It would be interesting to read more comments from those that have argued in this forum along the lines of the Global Climate Coalition.

Please add smileys when being ironic, Han.

[PassedOut]

It would be interesting to read more comments from those that have argued in this forum along the lines of the Global Climate Coalition.

Let's me guess. Here are some arguments I expect to see:

 

- Just because the Global Climate Coalition didn't believe their own statements doesn't make those statements wrong.

 

- This expose was published in the NYT, a news organization which stands to profit hugely if people believe in global warming.

 

- And so on.

 

I expect one day to see the companies that supported this propaganda argue in court that they are not liable for damages because "everyone knew" that those companies were causing global warming and did nothing to stop it.

[Lobowolf]

It would be interesting to read more comments from those that have argued in this forum along the lines of the Global Climate Coalition.

Let's me guess. Here are some arguments I expect to see:

 

- Just because the Global Climate Coalition didn't believe their own statements doesn't make those statements wrong.

 

- This expose was published in the NYT, a news organization which stands to profit hugely if people believe in global warming.

 

- And so on.

 

I expect one day to see the companies that supported this propaganda argue in court that they are not liable for damages because "everyone knew" that those companies were causing global warming and did nothing to stop it.

With respect to the Times, I'd expect to see it noted that the article leads with the 1995 internal memo, and a quotation from "throughout the early 90's" "even as the coalition worked to sway opinion."

 

Notwithstanding that, it's a damning expose', and I think the analogy to the tobacco companies is apt. I'm sure there will be some interesting, amusing, and ultimately hollow attempts at spin.

[onoway]

This quote is attributed to Congressman Henry Waxman

 

From an interview on NPR as relayed by Tavis Smiley:

 

“We’re seeing the reality of a lot of the North Pole starting to evaporate, and we could get to a tipping point. Because if it evaporates to a certain point - they have lanes now where ships can go that couldn’t ever sail through before. And if it gets to a point where it evaporates too much, there’s a lot of tundra that’s being held down by that ice cap..”

 

Aside from anything else, heaven help us if the tundra isn't gonna be held down anymore, who knows what might happen when it all flies off into space ... :angry:

[mike777]

On the recent 60 Minutes tv show there was a discussion of how we need to shut down all of our coal plants in the next 20 years. We do not have to 2050.

 

 

On another topic, it seems all the political talk so far on Cap and Trade tax treats it as a huge general budget revenue source not as revenue neutral as has been discussed in the WC. At this point it seems a basic carbon tax as has been discussed in some very helpful detail in the WC is off the table.

[luke warm]

i think it'll all be okay... soon we'll have the thermostat in the white house and plenty of green jobs/industries to reverse the trend... i'm thinking about going into the unicorn milk business, or maybe mine for rainbow dust

[PassedOut]

i think it'll all be okay... soon we'll have the thermostat in the white house and plenty of green jobs/industries to reverse the trend... i'm thinking about going into the unicorn milk business, or maybe mine for rainbow dust

I understand that you are joking, but what is your real point here?

[luke warm]

i think it'll all be okay... soon we'll have the thermostat in the white house and plenty of green jobs/industries to reverse the trend... i'm thinking about going into the unicorn milk business, or maybe mine for rainbow dust

I understand that you are joking, but what is your real point here?

that everything will be okay once we get all the carbon taxes (and tax credits) in place and once we (man) gets global temperatures under control by creating green businesses... what's yours?

[PassedOut]

everything will be okay once we get all the carbon taxes (and tax credits) in place and once we (man) gets global temperatures under control by creating green businesses...

Everything?

[cherdanno]

i think it'll all be okay... soon we'll have the thermostat in the white house and plenty of green jobs/industries to reverse the trend... i'm thinking about going into the unicorn milk business, or maybe mine for rainbow dust

I understand that you are joking, but what is your real point here?

that everything will be okay once we get all the carbon taxes (and tax credits) in place and once we (man) gets global temperatures under control by creating green businesses... what's yours?

If you fail to give your opinion openly again and again, resorting to sarcastic remarks and dishonest "i am just quoting so-and-so" posts, there comes a point where you become a useless, disgusting troll.

 

(Observers may have different opinion whether you have crossed that point already.)

[luke warm]

i think it'll all be okay... soon we'll have the thermostat in the white house and plenty of green jobs/industries to reverse the trend... i'm thinking about going into the unicorn milk business, or maybe mine for rainbow dust

I understand that you are joking, but what is your real point here?

that everything will be okay once we get all the carbon taxes (and tax credits) in place and once we (man) gets global temperatures under control by creating green businesses... what's yours?

If you fail to give your opinion openly again and again, resorting to sarcastic remarks and dishonest "i am just quoting so-and-so" posts, there comes a point where you become a useless, disgusting troll.

 

(Observers may have different opinion whether you have crossed that point already.)

but arend, i have given my opinion... i don't think carbon taxes and green jobs will make one drop of difference and i don't think those who support such things care... they've admitted as much many times, that the truth doesn't matter - the agenda does

 

by the way, where have i used a dishonest "i'm just quoting... " someone? and even if i have, what makes it dishonest?

 

i do find it humorous to see which posters on this forum are the ones to call names, though... childish but humorous

[hrothgar]

they've admitted as much many times, that the truth doesn't matter - the agenda does

Still spouting the same tired lies...

Still too stupid to be able to parse English...

Still programmed by the wingnuts...

 

Must be a comfortable sort of life, being able to check your brain at the door

[Winstonm]

i think it'll all be okay... soon we'll have the thermostat in the white house and plenty of green jobs/industries to reverse the trend... i'm thinking about going into the unicorn milk business, or maybe mine for rainbow dust

Jimmy,

 

This quote is nothing more than a tired, well-used type dig at the non-right wingers - to say it is anything else is to me dishonest.

[luke warm]

they've admitted as much many times, that the truth doesn't matter - the agenda does

Still spouting the same tired lies...

Still too stupid to be able to parse English...

Still programmed by the wingnuts...

 

Must be a comfortable sort of life, being able to check your brain at the door

hahahahaha... as prince obama (blessed be his name) would say, what you need to do is chill out, dick... are you denying that those on your side admit to not caring about the truth?

i think it'll all be okay... soon we'll have the thermostat in the white house and plenty of green jobs/industries to reverse the trend... i'm thinking about going into the unicorn milk business, or maybe mine for rainbow dust

Jimmy,

 

This quote is nothing more than a tired, well-used type dig at the non-right wingers - to say it is anything else is to me dishonest.

what are you talking about? one of us is confused, read the posts above and help me along here

[hrothgar]

hahahahaha... as prince obama (blessed be his name) would say, what you need to do is chill out, dick... are you denying that those on your side admit to not caring about the truth?

My position is the same as it was the last few times that you introduced this tired old lie...

 

Your sources consists of a set of selected quotes taken completely out of context.

 

For convenience, I'm going to quote a post I made the last time you made this ridiculous claim. It shut you up pretty quickly the last time around. Pity that your attention span is so short that you feel the need to circle back on precisely the same set of discredited claims.

 

Anyone wishing to review complete earlier thread is welcome to go to

http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?showtopic=18347&st=30

 

I will note that I have updated my original opinion in one important way. I am now firmly convinced that you fall in the "liar" category rather than just "lazy".

 

(I suppose that its still possible that you qualify as so appalling stupid that you can't recall a conversation from a couple years back; however, I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt...)

 

 

(luke warm @ Mar 17 2007, 02:04 AM)

 

>here are a few quotes (again) that some might have missed the first time i >posted them... while it's true that both sides have agendas, only one (that i've >found) admits that it's okay to lie... most of these are pathetic, and show the >intellectual honesty (or lack thereof) of the ones involved

 

>>We have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements,

>>and make little mention of any doubts we may have. Each of us has to decide

>>what the right balance is between being effective and being honest."

 

>>Stephen Schneider (leading advocate of the global warming theory)

>>(in interview for Discover magazine, Oct 1989) 

 

>so having an agenda outweighs honesty? it appears so... 

 

Just for the record Jimmy, given that you're so concerned with honesty you might want to consider providing a more complete version of Schneider's quote:

 

"On the one hand, as scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in

effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but — which means that we must include all the doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands, and buts. On the other hand, we are not just scientists but human beings as well. And like most people we'd like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climatic change. To do that we need to get some broadbased support, to capture the public's imagination. That, of course, entails getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. This 'double ethical bind' we frequently find ourselves in cannot be solved by any formula. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest. I hope that means being both."

 

One might make the claim that you presented an isolated snippet that was (largely) taken out of context... Hell, I'd go so far as to say that you were that you were misrepresenting Schneider's position in order to try to score a political point.

 

This doesn't really strike me as particularly honest.

 

(BTW, I'm completely prepared to believe that you were simply parroting some quote you found on another web site and were too lazy to bother doing a background search. I suppose that "lazy" is probably better than "liar")

 

[luke warm]

hahahahaha... as prince obama (blessed be his name) would say, what you need to do is chill out, dick... are you denying that those on your side admit to not caring about the truth?

My position is the same as it was the last few times that you introduced this tired old lie...

 

Your sources consists of a set of selected quotes taken completely out of context.

 

For convenience, I'm going to quote a post I made the last time you made this ridiculous claim. It shut you up pretty quickly the last time around. Pity that your attention span is so short that you feel the need to circle back on precisely the same set of discredited claims.

 

Anyone wishing to review complete earlier thread is welcome to go to

http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?showtopic=18347&st=30

 

I will note that I have updated my original opinion in one important way. I am now firmly convinced that you fall in the "liar" category rather than just "lazy".

 

(I suppose that its still possible that you qualify as so appalling stupid that you can't recall a conversation from a couple years back; however, I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt...)

 

 

(luke warm @ Mar 17 2007, 02:04 AM)

 

>here are a few quotes (again) that some might have missed the first time i >posted them... while it's true that both sides have agendas, only one (that i've >found) admits that it's okay to lie... most of these are pathetic, and show the >intellectual honesty (or lack thereof) of the ones involved

 

>>We have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements,

>>and make little mention of any doubts we may have. Each of us has to decide

>>what the right balance is between being effective and being honest."

 

>>Stephen Schneider (leading advocate of the global warming theory)

>>(in interview for Discover magazine, Oct 1989) 

 

>so having an agenda outweighs honesty? it appears so... 

 

Just for the record Jimmy, given that you're so concerned with honesty you might want to consider providing a more complete version of Schneider's quote:

 

"On the one hand, as scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in

effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but — which means that we must include all the doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands, and buts. On the other hand, we are not just scientists but human beings as well. And like most people we'd like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climatic change. To do that we need to get some broadbased support, to capture the public's imagination. That, of course, entails getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. This 'double ethical bind' we frequently find ourselves in cannot be solved by any formula. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest. I hope that means being both."

 

One might make the claim that you presented an isolated snippet that was (largely) taken out of context... Hell, I'd go so far as to say that you were that you were misrepresenting Schneider's position in order to try to score a political point.

 

This doesn't really strike me as particularly honest.

 

(BTW, I'm completely prepared to believe that you were simply parroting some quote you found on another web site and were too lazy to bother doing a background search. I suppose that "lazy" is probably better than "liar")

 

it's amazing to me, in spite of your masters from mit, that you seem as blatantly stupid as you do... anyone who reads the whole quote (and that, for those interested, is but one of many) can't help but note scheinder's worry about ethical binds... he says that as a scientist he must include everything, even his own doubts - but he says that he's a human as well as a scientist, and will not mention any doubts he may have... he hopes he can be both honest and effective, but is willing to sacrifice the one for the sake of the other... he does seem to say that the extent to which he might not be intellectually honest is a personal choice, and that each "... of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest ..." now if that isn't admitting that there is, at least in his mind, a balance beyond which honesty might not be the best policy, i don't know what is

 

anyone who isn't a complete toad can see what he's saying and why.. i did not take the "snippet" out of context, the context was the extent to which he (and again as reminder, the quote dick provided is but one of many) and others are willing to go to further an agenda... why you can't just admit it is beyond me

[hrothgar]

it's amazing to me, in spite of your masters from mit, that you seem as blatantly stupid as you do... anyone who reads the whole quote (and that, for those interested, is but one of many) can't help but note scheinder's worry about ethical binds... he says that as a scientist he must include everything, even his own doubts - but he says that he's a human as well as a scientist, and will not mention any doubts he may have... he hopes he can be both honest and effective, but is willing to sacrifice the one for the sake of the other... he does seem to say that the extent to which he might not be intellectually honest is a personal choice, and that each "... of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest ..." now if that isn't admitting that there is, at least in his mind, a balance beyond which honesty might not be the best policy, i don't know what is

Dual Masters from the Schools of Engineering and Management, actually... 4.92 GPA for what its worth. (All the A+s in the world won't make up for that one damn B)

 

Regardless, let's focus in on your direct claim

 

but he says that he's a human as well as a scientist, and will not mention any doubts he may have...

 

The Schneider quote says no such thing.

 

Schneider posits the existence of an ethical double-bind.

He states that that the solution can not be solved by any formula.

He expresses a hope that he is able to be both effective and honest.

 

Please explain how this is in any way equivalent to "will not mention any doubts that he might have."

 

I'd be shocked if you can find more than one or two folks on this forum who parse this the same way that you do.

 

As I noted earlier, I am constantly rendered incredulous that you can simultaneously condemn Schneider for lying while displaying a far more extremely version of the same set of behavior. You constantly misquote and misrepresent Schneider's writing in a desperate attempt at spin.

 

It's fairly clear where on the continuum you've decided to place yourself.